Negative Nelson: A Facebook Fable

Here's the scenario: I log in to my Facebook account to check on the status of my friends old and new.  I read their statuses and respond: wishing someone happy birthday, congratulating another on some serious weight loss, "liking" a funny post, cooing over a baby photo, offering a tidbit of parenting advice -- you know the drill.  It's friendly small talk, small celebrations, and generally uplifting interactions with family and friends -- a way to keep in touch without crazy effort.

And then I read it. The one status update that makes me cringe, makes me shake my head, muttering, "facebook should be FUN..."

I can't stand those cryptic inside joke kinds of status updates -- the ones begging for you to ask, "What are you talking about?"  I know it's fun and popular to play those games where everyone starts posting bra colors, purse locations, and candy names, but it honestly makes me roll my eyes.  And the statuses you're supposed to repost if you want love/luck/money, etc.?  The next evolution of chain letters.  Here's a hint: they don't work.

However, I am mainly talking about the person I've friended who may or may not be a relative or a close friend to someone to whom I may or may not be related. The person who uses his/her status update as a platform for an angry diatribe about his/her life, our government, the media -- whatever is ticking him/her off at the moment.  I am deliberately being vague so that I can avoid directly hurting his/her feelings 'cuz I'm kind like that. 

But I'm not too kind to skip blogging about it.  Yeah, I couldn't let another day slip by with the weight of this rant bearing down on my sense of humor.

So I blocked his/her status updates -- a choice that lets him/her continue to post xenophobic and offensive rants, but which allows me to avoid the Negative Nelson.  I am not naive enough to think that every day everyone should post a happy status -- heck, I've been guilty of posting a whine or two myself (like one I posted last night about anticipating being up all night with a sick infant -- for the record, I was).  But I don't think I post vitriol.  I don't take personal arguments online, dragging hundreds of rubberneckers into a private matter.  Yeah, that sounds sort of hypocritical coming from a woman who had no issue blogging about infertility, pregnancy and childbirth, but I take the position that what I am going through and doing is my story -- I sure as heck don't force it down anyone's throat.  Not only that, but you actually have to go to my blog to get my TMI.

How do I avoid that?  Twitter.  Seriously -- I Tweet my statuses and, though I am sure it is possible to offend in 140 characters or less, tweeting helps me keep my status updates at a manageable level -- no eight line paragraphs on illegal immigration, presidential rights/wrongs, or the quality of my relationship with my husband (except when he's super-awesome-and-righteously-cool). 

If you're using your facebook status as a political blog, perhaps you should just write a political blog, eh?  We're headed into the Iowa caucuses, the Presidential primary season, and an election cycle that promises to be brutal.  Let's be kind to each other and save the "How stupid can you be to vote for candidate X?" and "Candidate Y will ruin the country!" statuses unposted, 'kay?

So, what Facebook status pet peeves do you have?  How do you deal with the inappropriate social networker?  How do you make it work FOR you and not against you?

if you want, you can follow me on Twitter @IASoupMama or read my TMI on my blog.